American League Roundup : Tigers’ Evans Helps Yankees Stay in the Race

The New York Yankees turned down a chance to get Darrell Evans early in the season when the Detroit Tiger slugger was in a slump.

Evans has gone on to have a tremendous season. He finally gave the Yankees some help Tuesday night at Detroit, but it may be too late to do much good.

Evans hit two home runs, driving in three runs, to lead the Tigers to a 6-1 victory over Toronto and cut the Blue Jays’ lead to four games over the Yankees. The two home runs gave Evans 39 and the league lead.

The Blue Jays have five games remaining, the last three at home against the Yankees.

The slugging of Evans made it easy for Frank Tanana to improve his record to 11-14. Tanana pitched his third complete game, giving up nine hits.

The Tigers beat the Blue Jays’ leading winner, Doyle Alexander. Evans homered off of Alexander with two out in the first inning. In the third, after Lou Whitaker singled, Evans hit another.

It has been a sensational comeback from a disastrous start. After the first month of the season, he was hitting .214. The Tigers also were struggling and they wanted Yankee relief pitcher Mike Armstrong. The Yankees, probably thinking that the 38-year-old first baseman was nearing the end of the line, turned down the Tiger proposal.

Instead of helping the Yankees in their bid for the East title, Evans has gone it alone, trying to become the oldest player to lead the league in home runs.

Babe Ruth was 36 in 1931, when he and teammate Lou Gehrig each hit 40 home runs to tie for the title. In 1927, Fred Williams of Philadelphia was 39 when he hit 30 to share the National League title with Hack Wilson of the Chicago Cubs.

It is only fitting that Evans raise havoc with the Blue Jays after what he did to the Yankee hopes two weeks ago. In a three-game series at Detroit, he hit five home runs and the Tigers swept.

“It would mean an awful lot to me to win the home run title,” Evans told United Press International, “but I would gladly trade it for what happened last year. There is just no substitute for playing in the World Series.”

The best home run year for Evans was in 1973, when he hit 41 for the Atlanta Braves at age 26.

New York 6, Milwaukee 1--Joe Niekro continues to help the Yankees’ late drive to overtake the Blue Jays. The 40-year-old knuckleballer teamed with Dave Righetti for a five-hitter at New York as the Yankees won their sixth in a row.

Niekro, in winning his second in a row, held the Brewers to one hit in 5 innings before Righetti came to the rescue and picked up his 28th save.

“It was the most emotional game of my entire life,” said Niekro, whose father is in critical condition in a Wheeling, W. Va. hospital. “I wanted to say to Dad in my own way, ‘Go get ‘em.’ Yeah, it was my biggest game.”

Manager Billy Martin of the Yankees said: “I guess people in this town are going to start talking about the Yankees again.”

Boston 10, Baltimore 3--After receiving a three-game suspension before the Orioles’ drubbing by the Red Sox at Baltimore, Manager Earl Weaver lashed out angrily, calling it just “another case of dishonesty beating integrity.”

“Lying always beats out the truth in this game,” Weaver told reporters. “There’s no such thing as integrity. Dishonesty is always rewarded.”

Weaver was ejected from the first game of Sunday’s doubleheader, then thrown out of the second when he came to the plate with the lineup card.

“Between games,” Weaver said, “I learned from my players that (umpire Jim) Evans was hollering that he would like to take me out to the parking lot and kick my butt. I wanted to find out if Evans would admit saying it. He wouldn’t, although I believe my players. The umpire has lied to me on numerous occasions.”

Bill Buckner led the Red Sox assault with four hits, including a three-run home run.

Wade Boggs, who long ago clinched the batting title, doubled in the fifth. It was the 132nd game this season in which Boggs has had a hit. Al Simmons of the Philadelphia Athletics hit in 133 of 154 in 1925.

Cleveland 9, Seattle 3--Shortly after Manager Pat Corrales was given what management called a “perpetual” contract, the Indians routed the Mariners at Cleveland. It is the same type contract John McNamara of Boston and Bobby Cox of Toronto have.

Chicago 12, Minnesota 6--Ron Kittle hit two two-run home runs and Harold Baines hit a three-run smash to lead the White Sox’s 15-hit attack at Minneapolis.